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Tutorials and fixes for smartphone, gadget, and computer problems

Spotify: Disable Automatic Startup

Spotify: Disable Automatic Startup

by 58 Comments

Prevent Spotify from starting when your computer boots by disabling automatic startup.

Option 1

  1. Open “Spotify“.
  2. Select “Edit‘ > “Preferences” in Microsoft Windows or “Spotify” > “Preferences” in MacOS.
  3. Scroll all the way to the bottom and select the “Show Advanced Settings” button.
  4. Scroll to the “Startup and Window Behaviour” section.
  5. For the “Open Spotify automatically after you log into the computer” setting, use the drop-down menu to select “No“.

The setting is automatically saved once it’s selected. Now Spotify should no longer automatically launch whenever you start your computer. I should mention that I discovered a service called “SpotifyWebHelper” that allows you to start Spotify from a web page. You can disable “SpotifyWebHelper” from starting by turning the “Allow Spotify to be started from the Web” setting to “Off“.

Spotify Startup settings

Option 2 (Windows Only)

  1. Right-click a blank area of the taskbar, then choose “Task Manager“.
  2. Select the “Startup” tab.
  3. Right-click “Spotify“, then select “Disable“.

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Comments

  4. Zack says

    Thanks Dany Glezer! Your advice below worked, when nothing else did on OS X 10.5 Catalina. I actually just renamed the StartUpHelper.app file instead of deleting it, and that worked too.

    Right click on Spotify.app -> Show Package content.
    Open Contents/Library/LoginItems and delete StartUpHelper.app
    Restart your Mac and enjoy.

  5. JD says

    Thank you very, very much. I’ve been wondering how to accomplish this for a while. Once I found this article the matter was resolved. Again, thank you!

  9. Gustavo says

    Excellent explanation and to the point. You didn’t start -like so many do- giving a boring introduction. Thank you!

  13. K King says

    Yep, it worked – thankyou.
    It almost feels as if I have a VERY small amount of control over my computer.

  16. Polly says

    Thanks a lot ! i was worried for a month now i am relieved. This article helped a lot.

  17. Dr Troy says

    Windows:
    Open the Spotify app
    Click the three eclipses in the top left
    Select ‘edit’ then ‘preferences’
    Scroll to the bottom and select ‘Show Advanced Settings’
    Find ‘Startup and windows behavior’ set ‘open Spotify automatically’ to No
    Click HOME

  18. Mohit G says

    To the people who are saying it still starts up despite doing the above methods, rename the file “SpotifyStartupTask.exe” located in the folder “%AppData%\Spotify” to anything else for ex “SpotifyStartupTask.exe.bak”.
    Voila!

  19. Ben says

    Neither suggestion worked for me. “Open spotify automatically after you log into the computer” is set to “No”, but it opens it anyway. (Why ask a question if you’re going to ignore the answer?) Spotify is not in the Start-up tab in my task manager, so I cannot disable it. It is just not there.

    Raaaargh!

  24. Max says

    If you’re running Windows 10 and can’t get Spotify to stop opening when Windows starts – even with the startup option set to “No” in the Advanced section of Spotify’s preferences – you may have the Windows app store version of the program installed, even if you don’t think you have. So try this:

    – Search for Spotify in the Windows search bar
    – When it comes up in the list, right click it and select “App Settings”
    – A panel of Windows settings for the app will appear, not Spotify’s own settings
    – Find the “Runs at log-in” option. It will likely be greyed out. Click “Configure startup tasks” right underneath it
    – Find Spotify in the list which appears and uncheck it

    This worked for me. Your experience may differ. I had even used CCleaner and other methods to change startup entries without success until I tried the above procedure.

    I believe this is a problem caused by Windows being confused because it is possible to have downloaded and installed Spotify from the Spotify website as a regular program, and it is also possible to have downloaded and installed Spotify from the Windows app store as an “app”.

    If you’ve d’loaded it as a Windows app, you need to configure the Windows settings as described above (in addition to the regular “Edit > Preferences > [Show Advanced Settings] > Startup and Window Behavior >Open Spotify automatically after you log into the computer > No” fix within Spotify).

  25. Jason says

    Thanks for this information. It was extremely difficult to find a way to disable auto start with Spotify until I googled this! It’s not a very user friendly App. If it gives me anymore troubles I will just uninstall and forget about Spotify.

  26. nazren says

    can you do a tutorial of disabling auto startup spotify that been downloaded through windows store? thanks

  27. Martin says

    Hello to everybody,
    for me this worked for windows 10:

    Run “regedit” as administrator and delete the key

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Shared Tools\MSConfig\startupreg\Spotify

    Then restart the PC.

    Good day to Martin

  28. Sara says

    Thank you Dany Glezer!! Your instructions worked for me.
    Even after I had the preference set to “no,” it would still load on startup but trashing the login file worked.

  30. Yancarlo says

    Thanks, this recently started popping up on login for windows 10 and I can’t find a way to uninstall it, and you can’t access any settings related to having it automatically load without logging in. The task manager startup entry is something I had completely forgotten about.

  33. Dany Glezer says

    Right click on Spotify.app -> Show Package content.
    Open Contents/Library/LoginItems and delete StartUpHelper.app
    Restart your Mac and enjoy.

  34. K G says

    Thanks a lot! I hate apps that hijack your system like this. I’ve had it set to never open on startup and not to save it in the dock on mac. Yet it still opens on startup. I knew they had to have a setting in the app, your instructions led me straight there! Awesome!

  35. Andrew says

    This little bastard won’t stop showing up, I have it set to “No” and the damn thing doesn’t even show up under the startup tab stupid bastard

  36. ann must says

    it has been on “No” from the start on my mac, and the damn thing pops up all the time nevertheless! should i really uninstall it?

  37. David Nielsen says

    Thank you! I figured it’d be an on/off switch in Mac System Preferences, and deleted it there. But Spotify still came up on reboots…, which I hate because it uses a ton of space/energy on my iMac.

  38. Sydney Rome says

    It didn’t work for me I’m afraid. Whenever I reboot my Macbook the bloody app rears its ugly green head again.

  39. graeme says

    Thanks for this. Was doing my head in. Thought it would have been in my startup and could have been fixed by cleaner but that would be too easy. Thanks again Greatly appreciated.

  41. Beth C says

    I’m no computer expert by any means, but II found this to be helpful:

    Complete the directions listed above (Mac System Preferences/Users&Groups/Log-in Items – hide Spotify).
    OR – you can delete it from this menu completely. Spotify will still be on your computer, just not on the start automatically menu.

    Also, if Spotify is in your DOCK, try this: right click on Spotify Icon/options/uncheck.

    I would restart your Mac at this time. Hope this helps.

  44. AJB says

    I’ve changed this setting at least three times and it doesn’t ‘stick’. Spotify keeps showing up on startup. Using MacOS 10.13.4.

  45. Malky says

    The setting doesn’t save on a mac. I mean, who do these people think they are that they can impinge on my privacy? If i don’t want something to start on startup – i should bloody well have the right to stop it.
    I’m deleting this crap – and sticking with apple music.

  47. dylan says

    I got it to work. You have to right click the spotify icon, click options, and select “open at login” make sure there isn’t a check box next to this setting and it should be good. So dumb that I had to go around the world to fix that. They should add a save setting to the preferences page to avoid that.

  48. Dylan says

    I tried this. It won’t let me save the preferences after I’ve made the changes. I’m so tired of spotify I will have to find a different way of listening to music

  50. Ken says

    No, I can not stop it or change it even though I have admin rights.

    Please email me and tell me what can I do to block this site.

    Thanks,

    Ken

  53. Glaucia says

    Awesome!!
    I went to those settings before, but I think I was so fed-up that I couldn’t find the right option. Today this article made things much easier!!
    I still like to have a little control over my computer!! Thank You so much!

  54. Stixie says

    Love Spotify on my iPhone — not so much on my pc w/windows 10 — because it is a startup hog! Thank you for the easy-to-follow instructions to a vexing problem! Numbered steps plus screenshot made it a breeze to resolve. !

  55. Howard says

    It worked – many thanks! I have had Spotify for years and think it’s great but success seems to have gone to their heads! Imagine if all apps had this opening sneakily built in – we’d never get to read our emails!

  56. Jeff says

    I’ve done this multiple times but it won’t save that setting. Every time I restart, Spotify opens. What am I doing wrong? Thanks

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